.it's getting demmed cold."
He kicked the fire with the heel of his boot, making the logs
blaze in the old hearth. He seemed in no hurry to go, and apparently
was quite unconscious of his immediate danger. He dragged another
chair to the fire, and Chauvelin, whose impatience was by now quite
beyond control, sat down beside the hearth, in such a way as to command
a view of the door. Desgas had been gone nearly a quarter of an hour.
It was quite plane to Marguerite's aching senses that as soon as he arrived,
Chauvelin would abandon all his other plans with regard to the fugitives,
and capture this impudent Scarlet Pimpernel at once.
"Hey, M. Chauvelin," the latter was saying arily, "tell me, I
pray you, is your friend pretty? Demmed smart these little French
women sometimes--what? But I protest I need not ask," he added, as he
carelessly strode back towards the supper-table. "In matters of taste
the Church has never been backward. . . . Eh?"
But Chauvelin was not listening. His every faculty was now
concentrated on that door through which presently Desgas would enter.
Marguerite's thoughts, too, were centered there, for her ears had
suddenly caught, through the stillness of the night, the sound of
numerous and measured treads some distance away.
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